Sax Rohmer - THE DEVIL DOCTOR

orders. I can finish my journey by cab. I am--"

But Smith did not wait to learn whom he might be.

"Quick!" he cried to the stupefied chauffeur. "You passed a car a

minute ago--yonder. Can you overtake it?"

"I can try, sir, if I don't lose her track."

Smith leapt in, pulling me after him.

"Do it!" he snapped. "There are no speed limits for me. Thanks! Good

night, sir!"

We were off! The car swung around and the chase commenced.

One last glimpse I had of the man we had dispossessed, standing alone

by the roadside, and at ever-increasing speed, we leapt away in the

track of Eltham's captors.

Smith was too highly excited for ordinary conversation, but he threw

out short, staccato remarks.

"I have followed Fu-Manchu from Hong-Kong," he jerked. "Lost him at

Suez. He got here a boat ahead of me. Eltham has been corresponding

with some mandarin up-country. Knew that. Came straight to you. Only

got in this evening. He--Fu-Manchu--has been sent here to get Eltham.

My God! and he has him! He will question him! The interior of China--a

seething pot, Petrie! They had to stop the leakage of information.

_He_ is here for that."

The car pulled up with a jerk that pitched me out of my seat, and the

chauffeur leapt to the road and ran ahead. Smith was out in a trice,

as the man, who had run up to a constable, came racing back.

"Jump in, sir--jump in!" he cried, his eyes bright with the lust of

the chase; "they are making for Battersea!"

And we were off again.

Through the empty streets we roared on. A place of gasometers and

desolate waste lots slipped behind and we were in a narrow way where

gates of yards and a few lowly houses faced upon a prospect of high

blank wall.

"Thames on our right," said Smith, peering ahead. "His rathole is by

the river as usual. _Hi_!"--he grabbed up the speaking-tube--"Stop!

Stop!"

The limousine swung into the narrow sidewalk, and pulled up close by a

yard gate. I, too, had seen our quarry--a long, low-bodied car,

showing no inside lights. It had turned the next corner, where a

street lamp shone greenly not a hundred yards ahead.

Smith leapt out, and I followed him.

"That must be a cul-de-sac," he said, and turned to the eager-eyed

chauffeur. "Run back to that last turning," he ordered, "and wait

there, out of sight. Bring the car up when you hear a police-whistle."

The man looked disappointed, but did not question the order. As he

began to back away, Smith grasped me by the arm and drew me forward.

"We must get to that corner," he said, "and see where the car stands,

without showing ourselves."

I suppose we were not more than a dozen paces from the lamp when we

heard the thudding of the motor. The car was backing out!

It was a desperate moment, for it seemed that we could not fail to be

discovered. Nayland Smith began to look about him, feverishly, for a

hiding place, a quest which I seconded with equal anxiety. And Fate

was kind to us--doubly kind as after events revealed. A wooden gate

broke the expanse of wall hard by upon the right, and, as the result

of some recent accident, a ragged gap had been torn in the panels

close to the top.

The chain of the padlock hung loosely; and in a second Smith was up,

with his foot in this as in a stirrup. He threw his arm over the top

and drew himself upright. A second later he was astride the broken

gate.

"Up you come, Petrie!" he said, and reached down his hand to aid me.

I got my foot into the loop of chain, grasped at a projection in the

gate-post, and found myself up.

"There is a crossbar, on this side to stand on," said Smith.

He climbed over and vanished in the darkness. I was still astride the

broken gate when the car turned the corner, slowly, for there was

scanty room; but I was standing upon the bar on the inside and had my

head below the gap ere the driver could possibly have seen me.

"Stay where you are until he passes," hissed my companion, below.

"There is a row of kegs under you."

The sound of the motor passing outside grew loud--louder--then began

to die away. I felt about with my left foot, discerned the top of a

keg, and dropped, panting, beside Smith.

"Phew!" I said--"that was a close thing! Smith--how do we know--?"

"That we have followed the right car?" he interrupted. "Ask yourself

the question: what would any ordinary man be doing motoring in a place

like this at two o'clock in the morning?"

"You are right, Smith," I agreed. "Shall we get out again?"

"Not yet. I have an idea. Look yonder."

He grasped my arm, turning me in the desired direction.

Beyond a great expanse of unbroken darkness a ray of moonlight slanted

into the place wherein we stood, spilling its cold radiance upon rows

of kegs.

"That's another door," continued my friend. I now began dimly to

perceive him beside me. "If my calculations are not entirely wrong, it

opens on a wharf gate--"

A steam siren hooted dismally, apparently from quite close at hand.

"I'm right!" snapped Smith. "That turning leads down to the gate. Come

on, Petrie!"

He directed the light of the electric torch upon a narrow path through

the ranks of casks, and led the way to the farther door. A good two

feet of moonlight showed along the top. I heard Smith straining;

then--

"These kegs are all loaded with grease," he said, "and I want to

reconnoitre over that door."

"I am leaning on a crate which seems easy to move," I reported. "Yes,

it's empty. Lend a hand."

We grasped the empty crate, and, between us, set it up on a solid

pedestal of casks. Then Smith mounted to this observation platform and

I scrambled up beside him, and looked down upon the lane outside.

It terminated as Smith had foreseen at a wharf gate some six feet to

the right of our post. Piled up in the lane beneath us, against the

warehouse door, was a stack of empty casks. Beyond, over the way, was

a kind of ramshackle building that had possibly been a dwelling-house

at some time. Bills were stuck in the ground-floor windows indicating

that the three floors were to let as offices; so much was discernible

in that reflected moonlight.

I could hear the tide lapping upon the wharf, could feel the chill

from the near river and hear the vague noises which, night nor day,

never cease upon the great commercial waterway.

"Down!" whispered Smith. "Make no noise! I suspected it. They heard

the car following!"

I obeyed, clutching at him for support; for I was suddenly dizzy, and

my heart was leaping wildly--furiously.

"You saw her?" he whispered.

Saw her! Yes, I had seen her! And my poor dream-world was toppling

about me, its cities ashes and its fairness dust.

Peering from the window, her great eyes wondrous in the moonlight and

her red lips parted, hair gleaming like burnished foam and her anxious

gaze set upon the corner of the lane--was Kâramanèh ... Kâramanèh

whom once we had rescued from the house of this fiendish Chinese

doctor; Kâramanèh who had been our ally, in fruitless quest of

whom,--when, too late, I realized how empty my life was become--I had

wasted what little of the world's goods I possessed:--Kâramanèh!

"Poor old Petrie," murmured Smith. "I knew, but I hadn't the

heart--_He_ has her again--God knows by what chains he holds her. But

she's only a woman, old boy, and women are very much alike--very much